September 13, 2021: Difference between revisions
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{{dc|N}}{{start|orman Mailer ended his short story-writing career}} by blowing up the world. “The Last Night: A Story” was published in the December 1963 edition of ''Esquire'' and provided an apocalyptic transition between a struggling artist of the 1950s and the more mature and seasoned “author who takes himself seriously.”{{sfn|Lennon|2013|p=333}} The Mailer signing off in the pages of ''Esquire'' had discovered a new voice in ''Advertisements for Myself'' after a difficult decade had him questioning his own competence as a novelist. His second novel ''Barbary Shore'' had not been as well received as he would have liked, one critic calling it “evil-smelling” and another “paceless, tasteless, and graceless.”{{sfn|Rollyson|1991|p=71}} ''The Deer Park'' had publishing difficulties, recounted in “Mind of an Outlaw,” until Knopf, after a lengthy consideration, ultimately refused because Blanch Knopf was “almost irrationally terrified” of consequences to the publishing house.{{sfn|Lennon|2013|pp=179–180}} Even though these trials had Mailer considering that his breakout novel ''The Naked and the Dead'' might have been “an imposture,”{{sfn|Mailer|2020|loc=[https://projectmailer.net/pm/Lipton%E2%80%99s_Journal/December_31,_1954/159 #159]}} Walter Minton of Putnum’s finally | {{dc|N}}{{start|orman Mailer ended his short story-writing career}} by blowing up the world. “The Last Night: A Story” was published in the December 1963 edition of ''Esquire'' and provided an apocalyptic transition between a struggling artist of the 1950s and the more mature and seasoned “author who takes himself seriously.”{{sfn|Lennon|2013|p=333}} The Mailer signing off in the pages of ''Esquire'' had discovered a new voice in ''Advertisements for Myself'' after a difficult decade had him questioning his own competence as a novelist. His second novel ''Barbary Shore'' had not been as well received as he would have liked, one critic calling it “evil-smelling” and another “paceless, tasteless, and graceless.”{{sfn|Rollyson|1991|p=71}} ''The Deer Park'' had publishing difficulties, recounted in “Mind of an Outlaw,” until Knopf, after a lengthy consideration, ultimately refused because Blanch Knopf was “almost irrationally terrified” of consequences to the publishing house.{{sfn|Lennon|2013|pp=179–180}} Even though these trials had Mailer considering that his breakout novel ''The Naked and the Dead'' might have been “an imposture,”{{sfn|Mailer|2020|loc=[https://projectmailer.net/pm/Lipton%E2%80%99s_Journal/December_31,_1954/159 #159]}} Walter Minton of Putnum’s finally agreed to publish ''The Deer Park'', but only after Mailer’s dark night of the soul forced him to take a long, critical look at himself and to pick up the mantle of the artist/rebel to transform himself and his work. | ||
Mailer’s views at the time were expansive. He longed to be something great, and he knew he had the capacity and desire to prove himself a “major writer,” though he was tired of playing “the comic figure” running “the circuit from Rinehart to Putnamn.”{{sfn|Mailer|2013|pp=89, 88, 87}} Even before Minton accepted ''The Deer Park'', Mailer had been ready to self-publish the novel “to make a kind of publishing history”{{sfn|Mailer|2013|p=87}} and as an act of defiance against the “gentlemen” of the publishing industry that had become too conservative and spineless. He writes: “I was finally open to my anger. I turned within my psyche I can almost believe, for I felt something shift to murder in me. I finally had the simple sense to understand that if I wanted my work to travel further than others, the life of my talent depended on fighting a little more, and looking for help a little less.”{{sfn|Mailer|2013|p=90}} Mailer’s conviction to become a “psychic outlaw” has its genesis in his negative experience in publishing ''The Deer Park'', but his thoughts were leaning in this direction even before: specifically in his later short fiction that acts as a proving ground for ideas he workshopped in ''Lipton’s Journal'' and published in ''Advertisements for Myself''—specifically in “The White Negro.” The group of short stories dating from the winter of 1951–52 and those that followed allowed Mailer a fictional space to explore the dissident and subversive ideas that would characterize his breakthrough work of the 1960s. | |||
For Mailer, short fiction was not to be taken as seriously as novels. | |||
. . . | . . . | ||
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* {{cite book |last=Lennon |first=J. Michael |date=2013 |title=Norman Mailer: A Double Life |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MlftBAAAQBAJ |location=New York |publisher=Simon and Schuster |ref=harv }} | * {{cite book |last=Lennon |first=J. Michael |date=2013 |title=Norman Mailer: A Double Life |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MlftBAAAQBAJ |location=New York |publisher=Simon and Schuster |ref=harv }} | ||
* {{cite web |url=https://prmlr.us/liptons |title=Lipton’s Journal |last=Mailer |first=Norman |editor1-last=Lennon |editor1-first=J. Michael |editor2-last=Lucas |editor2-first=Gerald R. |editor3-last=Mailer |editor3-first=Susan |date={{date|2020}} |website=Project Mailer |publisher=The Norman Mailer Society |access-date={{date|2021-09-13|ISO}} |quote= |ref=harv }} | * {{cite web |url=https://prmlr.us/liptons |title=Lipton’s Journal |last=Mailer |first=Norman |editor1-last=Lennon |editor1-first=J. Michael |editor2-last=Lucas |editor2-first=Gerald R. |editor3-last=Mailer |editor3-first=Susan |date={{date|2020}} |website=Project Mailer |publisher=The Norman Mailer Society |access-date={{date|2021-09-13|ISO}} |quote= |ref=harv }} | ||
* {{cite book |last=Mailer |first=Norman |date={{date|2013}} |chapter=Mind of an Outlaw |title=Mind of an Outlaw |url= |location=New York |publisher=Random House |editor-last=Sipiora |editor-first=Phillip |pages=83–106 |isbn= |author-link= |ref=harv }} | |||
* {{cite book |last=Rollyson |first=Carl |date=1991 |title=The Lives of Norman Mailer |location=New York |publisher=Paragon House |ref=harv }} | * {{cite book |last=Rollyson |first=Carl |date=1991 |title=The Lives of Norman Mailer |location=New York |publisher=Paragon House |ref=harv }} | ||
{{refend}} | {{refend}} | ||
Revision as of 09:39, 16 September 2021
Norman Mailer ended his short story-writing career by blowing up the world. “The Last Night: A Story” was published in the December 1963 edition of Esquire and provided an apocalyptic transition between a struggling artist of the 1950s and the more mature and seasoned “author who takes himself seriously.”[1] The Mailer signing off in the pages of Esquire had discovered a new voice in Advertisements for Myself after a difficult decade had him questioning his own competence as a novelist. His second novel Barbary Shore had not been as well received as he would have liked, one critic calling it “evil-smelling” and another “paceless, tasteless, and graceless.”[2] The Deer Park had publishing difficulties, recounted in “Mind of an Outlaw,” until Knopf, after a lengthy consideration, ultimately refused because Blanch Knopf was “almost irrationally terrified” of consequences to the publishing house.[3] Even though these trials had Mailer considering that his breakout novel The Naked and the Dead might have been “an imposture,”[4] Walter Minton of Putnum’s finally agreed to publish The Deer Park, but only after Mailer’s dark night of the soul forced him to take a long, critical look at himself and to pick up the mantle of the artist/rebel to transform himself and his work.
Mailer’s views at the time were expansive. He longed to be something great, and he knew he had the capacity and desire to prove himself a “major writer,” though he was tired of playing “the comic figure” running “the circuit from Rinehart to Putnamn.”[5] Even before Minton accepted The Deer Park, Mailer had been ready to self-publish the novel “to make a kind of publishing history”[6] and as an act of defiance against the “gentlemen” of the publishing industry that had become too conservative and spineless. He writes: “I was finally open to my anger. I turned within my psyche I can almost believe, for I felt something shift to murder in me. I finally had the simple sense to understand that if I wanted my work to travel further than others, the life of my talent depended on fighting a little more, and looking for help a little less.”[7] Mailer’s conviction to become a “psychic outlaw” has its genesis in his negative experience in publishing The Deer Park, but his thoughts were leaning in this direction even before: specifically in his later short fiction that acts as a proving ground for ideas he workshopped in Lipton’s Journal and published in Advertisements for Myself—specifically in “The White Negro.” The group of short stories dating from the winter of 1951–52 and those that followed allowed Mailer a fictional space to explore the dissident and subversive ideas that would characterize his breakthrough work of the 1960s.
For Mailer, short fiction was not to be taken as seriously as novels.
. . .
Citations
- ↑ Lennon 2013, p. 333.
- ↑ Rollyson 1991, p. 71.
- ↑ Lennon 2013, pp. 179–180.
- ↑ Mailer 2020, #159.
- ↑ Mailer 2013, pp. 89, 88, 87.
- ↑ Mailer 2013, p. 87.
- ↑ Mailer 2013, p. 90.
Works Cited
- Lennon, J. Michael (2013). Norman Mailer: A Double Life. New York: Simon and Schuster.
- Mailer, Norman (2020). Lennon, J. Michael; Lucas, Gerald R.; Mailer, Susan, eds. "Lipton's Journal". Project Mailer. The Norman Mailer Society. Retrieved 2021-09-13.
- Mailer, Norman (2013). "Mind of an Outlaw". In Sipiora, Phillip. Mind of an Outlaw. New York: Random House. pp. 83–106.
- Rollyson, Carl (1991). The Lives of Norman Mailer. New York: Paragon House.
